And people give all sorts of different, amazing reasons for it.
They all agree, however, upon one point—that she has lost her looks completely.
Smoke
Suddenly, as the motor was passing the Place de la Concorde, Valérie said, "Would you mind if we just went home? I should like to go home."
Of course Nanette could only say that she did not mind.
Valérie had invited her to drive in the Bois and have tea at the little chalet of gaufres, by the gate of the Pré Catelan; she had her mother's motor car for the afternoon, and they need not take anybody with them. Nanette had thought it would be such fun, just the two of them, without governesses or maids. She had been looking forward to it for days.
Nanette was still in the schoolroom, whereas Valérie, nearly two years older, had escaped from all that. The younger girl admired Valérie immensely. They had seen a good deal of one another three years before in a summer at Dinard. Then the difference between their ages had mattered less; but now, dividing the schoolroom girl with her hair just tied back from the girl who would have been going out if war had not ended the world, it invested Valérie with a glamour of romance for the little Nanette. The romance, moreover, was heightened by the fact that people talked rather much of the older girl and coupled her name most unhappily with that of a man she never could marry, who was proving himself to be one of the heroes of the war.
Nanette would have been very proud to have had tea in the Bois with her beautiful friend. She said she did not mind turning back, but she did mind rather. She thought it odd indeed of Valérie to change like that. And Valérie's way of saying it was so odd, as if she had been all the time trying to keep it back and could not.
Valérie spoke through the tube to the chauffeur, and he turned the car.